Art style

The art style of an animation basically means the visual aesthetics and techniques that are used to create the animation.

The original art style for the original animation short was an anime art style.  I wanted to explore a different style for the remake of the animation short.

After doing some research into different art styles for this major project, I decided to do some art style tests to help me to decide on which style I wanted to go with for the animation short.  In the end, I chose a style that was inspired by the art style used in Bee and the PuppyCat animation short that I watched.

 

Character designs

Elizabeth – originals

 

 

 

Simon – originals

Originally I  planned to just redraw the character designs in the new art style.  However, I  later change my mind as I thought this would be too lazy. I also realised that the clothing and hairstyle weren’t in the correct time period of the 1840’s so I made sure to do the proper research and redrew the character designs to reflect the time period and costumes.

Final character designs

 

Elizabeth – Final design

 

 

 

Simon – Final design

 

 

Above are the final character designs which are based on the 1840s.

I kept the ribbon from the old character design that was inspired by Maria Merryweather.  She is the main heroine in the film,  ‘The Secret of Moonacre.

Original storyboards

When coming up with the new story for this animation I did a very quick, rough storyboard sketch to get my ideas down on paper before they went out of my head.

 

Final storyboards

Above are the final storyboards.

Once the story was finalised, Abbi and I worked on our storyboards for the animation short.

Unfortunately, after some feedback in for the animatic,  we didn’t end up using the storyboards Abbi created.

I didn’t make new story boards for the ending of the short. Instead I edited the ending when creating the animatic.

Key Frames

I made these keyframes before I did the animatic to help me out with framing out some main scenes. They also helped me to get a rough idea of what colour I wanted to end up using.

First animatic

Below is my first animatic.

After getting some feedback I made any corrections that were needed and produced my final animatic.

Final animatic

This is the final animatic for the major project.   With this down I can start working on the main animation.

 

Colour scripts

 

Before I start on working on the main animations I created some colour script for the major project.  I chose reds to represent the drama and tension in the dream sequence.  Blues for under the underwater scene and then muted golden colours to represent dawn and Elizabeth waking up.

Test animations

In addition to working on the colour scripts, I also did a couple of animation tests. This allowed me to get an idea on how the animation process will be from start to finish.